


never let go

by Skyepilot



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst and Feels, Arguing, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Humor, Male-Female Friendship, Sex, Sick Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-12
Updated: 2018-02-12
Packaged: 2019-03-17 03:27:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13650468
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skyepilot/pseuds/Skyepilot
Summary: Daisy makes Coulson promise to give her one day. Set during S5.





	never let go

**Author's Note:**

  * For [zauberer_sirin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/gifts).



He made her a promise.

It was all he could do, as far as promises go. Just a day that belonged to them.

If the universe didn't work against them, which sounds very fatalistic, but then here they are. Her fated to destroy the world and him dying from the stuff that brought him back from the dead.

Still, he wanted to hope for the best. He wants Daisy to hope, too.

Without the team around and Fitz talking about curses and how spacetime is fixed. Without the angry world they had to save that still feared and hated Inhumans. Without the governments that wanted to chase Quake and SHIELD to the ends of the Earth before they could save it.

She told him she was being selfish, and she knew it, but so what? Because he was selfish when he brought her back with him. She is still angry about that, but now she also knows that he's dying and she's angry all of the time and will probably still be afterwards.

They're pretending, he knows that, too. Still, for some reason, a poem he read when he was much younger, returns to him today, in the early morning light. About love being the dream and a life without it like having been asleep.

He was asleep until he woke again, and met Daisy. It was all worth it.

"So what does the 'J' stand for?" she asks him, her hair whipping around her face with the wind as she drives them down the backroads. "Your middle name?"

Her expression is amused and he realizes that she's caught him staring again. He thinks maybe he's been doing it all along, and she's just now decided-

"Is it J? Just the letter," she goes on, being chatty. "No actual real middle name?"

"You don't have a middle name," he tells her, a little amused at this ask of all things, but she probably has her reasons.

"Apparently not," she says with a small smile, looking him over like she's trying to see behind his aviators. "Actually, they don't really do middle names in China. My mother didn't have one, either."

"Mine was very insistent," he remembers. "Phillip wasn't exactly a popular kids name in Manitowoc. My dad wanted something more conventional. And Catholic."

"I forget that about you. Where did she get Phillip from?" she asks over the clanging bell, leaning her arm on Lola's door while they wait at the crossing as the railcars move along in front of them.

"Sleeping Beauty," he admits with a smirk, expecting her to start the teasing at any moment.

"Oh, that's sweet," she tells him softly, almost so much so that he can't hear, and then she looks away, like she's getting lost in more serious thoughts. He needs coffee for that.

"Guess."

"Guess what?"

"Guess my middle name," he shrugs at her, tapping his fingers on the passenger door, trying not to stare at how soft she looks in this light.

The train has passed and she drives them up and over the train tracks, to a place that he can certainly guess at, and it probably involves food.

"Jerry," she tosses back at him, as he sighs and rolls his eyes, then leans forward to switch on the radio.

"Hey, PJ," she says, brushing away his hand. "Why don't you give me a hint?"

"I already did," he tells her, and reaches for the dial again.

  
+++

  
"We never did get to have those pancakes. Not the way you wanted it to go."

She's rearranging the packets of sugar, as they both watch her hands and he sips on his diner coffee.

It's sweet that she brought him all the way out here to do this moment over.

"Were you planning on that being your last supper, before you died in prison?"

The words feel like a slap, but he's gotten used to it since they've come back. There's a sharpness there that wasn't always between them, but they have both had to endure loss and cruelty and suffering. Especially Daisy.

"I guess you're not the only one good at playing martyr," he shoots back at her, and watches her eyes narrow and stare up into his.

They're almost saved from their staring match by the waitress returning with their plates stacked up with pancakes.

"Syrup?" she asks, in that overly friendly tone that's really not that friendly at all. She's got a lot of other tables to get to.

"Boysenberry," he says flatly, eyes still locked across the table on Daisy.

"Maple, because, apparently, I'm a martyr," she says with a thin smile and looks up at the waitress and blinks until she walks off to retrieve them.

He starts to smile when she shakes her head at him and sighs. She can't let go of it, and she can't hold onto it, either. It's something in between. In a way it's a sort of metaphor for them, it seems.

She takes a bite of the pancakes impatiently, tired of waiting for the syrup to show up.

"My middle name is-"

"Not yet," she tells him, before he can blurt it out.

He can feel himself starting to frown, trying to puzzle his way through it, staring again too much until the waitress returns and dumps the syrup bottles on the table unceremoniously.

"Okay," he sighs, and reaches for the berry syrup and starts to pour it over his pancakes with his prosthetic. It used to be a lot harder to do this.

"You don't just pour it all over the top?" she asks, watching him lift the edge of the pancakes with his fork.

"I like to layer it up," he answers, but he's really thinking about something else.

"I knew you wouldn't tell me your middle name right away," she says to him, like she's reading his thoughts. "It's kind of funny, that after all these years, I still don't know it."

There's a tinge of regret in her voice, and he stops and puts his syrup down, then reaches with his other hand across the table and puts it on her wrist.

She gets very still, and he wonders if maybe this isn't helping. He thinks about her reaching out for his hand at one point, and how he was so angry, he only appreciated the gesture later.

"You never asked until now."

Her lips press together in a tight line, and she nods at him, and then starts to eat again.

He stares out of the diner window at the small town.

  
###

"Looks like it might rain."

He follows her gaze up towards the sky and the dark clouds that are forming there.

The weather can change quickly here, and Daisy manages to talk the diner cashier into letting her leave Lola parked under the awning for protection.

It doesn't take much convincing, really, and he watches them talk about Lola and Daisy tells him the story of how she was restored, how he put in the work with his father.

"Oh, this is his car?" the clerk says with a grin, "I thought it was yours since you were driving."

"It looks better with her driving," he finds himself answering, and Daisy freezes again, and locks eyes with him. "It's really hers."

"Ours," Daisy corrects him, with a sharpness in her voice, while he stands there silently.

"Okay," he tells her after a moment, pressing his tongue against the edge of his teeth, then thanks the clerk as Daisy starts to walk back towards the town.

"So Lola's mine now?" she asks, when he starts to catch up with her, feels the splash of a drop on the crown of his head, and touches the dampness there.

"Why not?" he tells her. "You don't want her?" Silence. "Fine. Mack will."

"That's not the point, and you know it," she tells him, spinning around on him. There is a crack of thunder, and the rain is starting to come more frequently now.

"If you're giving up now, we're done," she tells him, levelling her hand at him.

"Done for today," he asks, raising his eyebrows at the challenge. "Or done for good?"

"I think you know which," she tells him, and wipes at a wet drop sliding down the side of her face, and he feels his mouth turn into a frown, matching hers.

"Do you want to talk about this?" he asks loudly. "Or do you want to keep pretending that this is-"

"I'd like to get out of the rain," she tells him, as he turns to look back at the diner, then takes her hand and pulls her after him.

He walks at first, then they run down the empty street as the rain gets heavier, rushing into the first shop they can find.

"Forgot your umbrella?"

They both look up at the man behind the counter, at the rows of rocks and crystals, and he sighs. "Yeah."

"Cool, more rocks," Daisy says with a tinge of dark humor, and lets go of his hand and walks further into the store.

He gives the clerk a polite smile and follows after her into the back of the shop.

"Crystals are supposed to help with good energy, right?" he says, moving closer to her, pretending to look the neatly arranged rows and descriptions.

"Sure, I've had a lot of luck with those." She stops and turns around to face him in the narrow space.

"So have I," he tells her, watching her eyes move across his face. "We both have."

He sniffs and wipes at the trickle of water on the end of his nose, and waits, until she rolls her eyes and turns back around.

"There's a couple of galleries," she tells him, touching all of the smooth stones. "You like art and stuff, right?"

"Do you?"

She stops again and almost looks at him over her shoulder. "I mean, I like some art."

"About revolutions and change? That feels like you're a part of something bigger?"

"Yes, that sounds like me."

He can see the corner of her mouth starting to turn up.

  
###

  
They stop to have a beer once the sun comes out again, but Daisy's hair is still damp, like their clothes, and she keeps playing with strands of it.

Neither one of them like the art here very much. They kind of agreed on that, except for some interesting tapestry about DNA and migration patterns which really once they started talking about it, got kind of morbid.

"This is the worst non-date that I think I've ever been on," he tells her, as she glances up at him sharply. She looks offended, more hurt than angry. "What I mean, is, can we start over again?"

"I'm not very good at pretending when it comes to stuff like this," she admits, pulling at the edge of the label on her beer. "With someone like you."

He wants to know what that means, but he's still afraid to ask. Even after all this time.

"Then let's stop pretending," he says instead.

She's looking at him like she is trying to unpack exactly what that means. That maybe she is as much at a loss for words as he is.

"Okay," she decides, and finishes off her beer, and waits for him to do the same, then stands up from the picnic table.

Her hand is open, held out towards him, and he takes it and lets her pull him to his feet, and instead of letting go, her fingers twist in his, locking them together and she guides them back towards the street they came in on.

Maybe she wants to leave this place. He thinks about how she wanted to run, once. They're near the border. They could just run.

The idea sends a moment of thrill through him. She wouldn't have to destroy anything. And she would still be with him, until the very end, whenever that comes.

It's such a selfish thought, it's almost shocking.

He knows they'll never do it.

"They say you can see a lot of stars out here when it gets dark," she tells him. "I think we've seen enough stars to last a lifetime, right? I don't want to relive all of our greatest hits, I want to think about what's in front of us."

She stops them in front of the Red Box at the gas station on the corner, like she's had a revelation.

"How do you feel about a movie and a pizza?"

"I think it sounds great," he answers, and he sees her give him the first genuine smile- he thinks he might remember the last time she did. When he told her about wanting her to be Director.

He knows he would give almost anything to see that smile again.

They start to look through the selections available, settling on a comedy She digs out her phone and starts trying to find a place for them to watch it.

"Can you figure out the pizza?" she asks him, as she turns away to talk into the phone. He does a quick search and decides on something when she comes back and shows him a picture on her phone. A small house with a living room, and a decent looking couch.

He shows her the pizza place he's found, and scrolls with his thumb to show her the good reviews.

"Done," she tells him with a sense of accomplishment.

They both press their phones and start walking back towards the diner and Lola.

  
###

He comes back with the pizza to find Daisy showered and sitting on the couch, setting up the DVD player.

There's a big front window, and a huge cactus plant filling the view. It's enclosed by a privacy fence, and down the street from the shop they first hopped into during the rainstorm.

The parking is covered and Lola is visible from the window if you crane your head a bit.

It's filled with sunset light and the screen door bangs shut hard behind him startling Daisy for a moment, then she smiles again.

He places the pizza down on the coffee table and opens the plastic bag to take out the plates and the bottles of soda, then arranges them and sits down on the couch.

She gets the titles up on the screen and he flips open the top of the box and watches her eyes light up.

"This looks so good," she tells him, reaching for a slice. "What took you so long?"

"There was a basketball team that ordered 20 pizzas just before I showed up," he tells her with a smirk, and twists the bottle open. "Soda?"

He watches her eyes roll back and then she swallows and lifts a finger until she finishes. "It was worth it. The best pizza I've ever had."

Leaning across him, she grabs the other bottle of soda, and then hits play on the controller as he takes his first bite.

"Damn, this is fantastic," he agrees with her, and then folds the thin slice in half like he watched her do so he can get a bigger second bite.

"There's a dryer back there," she tells him, looking over his button down shirt. "If you want to throw it in there? The movie can wait."

At the back of the house there is a washer and dryer, and he unbuttons his dress shirt, and touches his chest through the t-shirt fabric. He can feel the raised mark over his heart, and the tendrils where it's spread.

After tossing it in and starting it, he listens for a moment to the familiar sound, and looks around the quaint kitchen with it's mismatched coffee cups, and wishes he had promised her more than just a day.

But he doesn't want to keep her waiting, and comes back to sit down next to her on the couch, and starts to loosen his shoes, as she reaches for another piece of pizza and then curls up closer to him.

"Ready?"

Later, when he wakes up, he finds the moonlight on the floor, and Daisy's cheek hot against his shoulder.

He knows how well Daisy fits in his arms. How she's so powerful but still has some smallness left to her, and he moves his shoulder out of the way and then tucks her against his arm and starts to lift her.

"How can you lift me, I added about 20 pounds of pizza."

She doesn't remember him carrying her back to the past. He does. And she curls her arms around his neck as he makes his way into the bedroom and flips the light on.

As he lowers her, her hand holds on to the front of his shirt. "Stay."

It's an invitation, but it's also a plea. Still, he finds himself hesitating.

"I want your name." Her voice sounds angry again. "I want the parts of you I don’t know. I don’t want to feel guilty about needing you now."

Her hand lets go of his shirt, leaving an imprint there, and he stands and then switches off the lights and hears her rustling her way under the covers.

And he can't say no to her now, if he ever really could.

He peels back the covers and gets into the bed beside her.

"It’s James," he says, turning to her in the dark.

"I thought so."

  
+++

  
He thinks about darkness lately.

He remembers things after TAHITI, but he’s not sure what is real or not.

This darkness, is filled with Daisy.

The taste of her, her smell, her voice.

Things he wants to take with him, if he can't stay with her. He has to hope.

He shuts his eyes reflexively to commit it to memory. His hands hold onto her like he is holding the beginning of everything.

Before, when he had screwed up the courage to ask. It had sounded so old-fashioned: "Do you want me to make love to you?"

Then her pause, before her answer. "I was thinking the other way around, but sure, that sounds nice."

They waited for so long.

Why did they wait?

Daisy moans, and that smile again. He feels it against his mouth and drinks from it. Her hands getting bolder, moving along his body like she's claiming it.

The same thrill that he had before at the thought of running with her. They did. They ran here. Right into each other. And it's like being stripped down and made over again.

She takes control just as his starts to slip away.

Chasing the tiny pleading noises from the back of his throat, her hips repeating the same motion, as he dots them with her name.

She is holding him, fiercely, finding his hands and linking their fingers together, after she presses his wrists into the mattress.

"I won't let you go."

"Don't."

It seems like they have finally reached an agreement about what this is, and he makes his body move with hers, raising his hips up off the mattress and she lets him go, taking something for herself, and he's so grateful when she shivers above him, sending him over the edge after her, collapsing into his arms.

Letting him hold her again, as she buries her face into the crook of his neck while they catch their breath.

He feels her inhale deeply against his skin.

"I like the real thing better."

He runs his fingers along her damp hair, pressing his cheek against her forehead.

He remembers every time he's touched her before, and how this is the same, but new.

  
+++

He doesn't die. Not really.

Because Daisy saves him again.


End file.
